


On our own terms

by Trojie



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Dubious Consent, Hate Sex, M/M, Magic, Minor Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-27
Updated: 2011-05-27
Packaged: 2017-10-19 20:19:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/204815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trojie/pseuds/Trojie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry starts it. Draco will end it. It's not a love story.</p>
            </blockquote>





	On our own terms

**Author's Note:**

> Beta-read by Bridget.

There would have been taunting, last year.

There would have been _words_ , names spat, vitriol flying through the air, last year.

The spells they flung at each other would have been jinxes and hexes, not curses.

There would at least have been a smirk on Malfoy's face.

The bathroom tiles were wet under Harry's face as he watched for Malfoy's feet at the other end of the row of stalls, wand at the ready. His face was wet, his robes were wet. There were specks of water on the lenses of his glasses, making the grey light smear and flash every time he moved.

The world spun and broke like the inside of a kaleidoscope as he rolled out of the way of Malfoy's curse, leapt up, ducked behind a stall, waited for the footsteps.

Footsteps never came, so Harry, impatient as the grave, edged forward.

He deliberated which spell to use. Last year, it would have been _Expelliarmus, Stupefy, Petrificus Totalus_.

This year, only one thing floated up into his mind.

 _For Enemies ..._

' _Sectumsempra!_ ' Harry roared, coming out from behind the stalls wand-first. He didn't even know what it did, just thought, if ever there was a time to use something, if ever he had an enemy, it was now. It was Malfoy. It'd used to be a stupid, petty schoolboy rivalry, but Malfoy had crossed a line. He wasn't a schoolboy any more, he was one of them. Harry knew it.

Malfoy staggered back, blood blossoming red through his shirtsleeve, the first splash of real colour in the scene. He clamped the palm of his wand-hand to the wound, lifted it, inspected it. Raised his now-bloodied wand to fire back, but Harry'd crossed the distance between them and pushed Malfoy against the wall, jamming him up against the side of the first of a row of hand-basins so he couldn't escape.

'You're bleeding,' he said.

'Well spotted, Potter,' Malfoy spat, wincing as Harry pulled the sleeve up to look at the gash. Not deep, very clean. 'That could have been my throat, Potter, if your aim hadn't been off,' he added. 'How would that have felt?'

'Shut up, Malfoy,' gritted Harry, pressing a knee in to hold Malfoy firmer as he tore a strip off the hem of his own shirt and tried, clumsily, to bandage the wound one-handed.

'Have you ever killed anything, Potter?'

'I said shut up, Malfoy.'

'I have.'

Harry didn't reply.

'You don't know what I'm capable of, Potter. You ought to stay out of my way.'

Harry finished tying off the bandage with a hint of a flourish, and raised his eyes back to Malfoy's.

'If you were any kind of wizard, Potter, you'd have healed that,' said Malfoy, apparently completely unable to just let things be. And then he raised his wand, which Harry had thought trapped. 'And if you had any kind of brain, you'd've run the second you managed to hit me.'

And there they were, Malfoy's wand in the hollow of Harry's throat, Harry's jammed awkwardly into Malfoy's side, blood seeping between them insidiously. A tableau of two boys, a still-life in red and white and black and grey. Harry could see them in the mirror, could see the water flecked on his own hair and eyelashes, the pallor of Malfoy's neck up against the age-fogged glass. Movement -the bobbing of a throat - caught his eye and he returned his gaze to the real Malfoy. To the real Malfoy's blood-loss-pale skin, damp blond hair curling at his ears. To the real Malfoy's teeth caught painfully in his lower lip, bitten pink and sore-looking. To where Malfoy looked down, aside, anywhere but Harry.

Harry's other senses caught up with his eyes, heard the quickening of Malfoy's breath, the heat beneath his robes. Felt sensation suddenly return to his own body as he realised that while his mind had been elsewhere the rest of him had not.

He dropped the ends of the makeshift bandages, fiddling his wand into an easier hold so that he could also grab Malfoy's shoulder with that hand, keep him still, use the other hand to cup Malfoy's chin.

He couldn't drag his eyes from that bitten lip. He wanted to lick it. He wanted to bite it himself, truth be told.

He'd made Malfoy bleed, could have killed him if his aim were better. What would that have proven? Malfoy said he'd killed before like it was something to be proud of.

'Go on then, Potter,' said Malfoy. 'You've got me, so go ahead.' He shrugged his shoulder awkwardly, making the end of Harry's wand poke into the meat of his neck. 'You can find out what it's like, to ...'

 _Kill me_ hung unspoken on the end of that sentence. So did _kiss me_ , and _touch me_ and _fuck me_.

Harry couldn't hold back any longer, seeing Malfoy smirk as if he didn't care, with his blood tinting the puddles on the white tiles all around them and Harry's knee between his thighs. As if he couldn't care less what Harry did with his trapped and yet unyielding body. Harry pushed in, left Malfoy no space. He never could have backed down from one of Malfoy's challenges, never, and especially not like this.

'Do it,' growled Malfoy against Harry's lips, just before opening up to him. There was a clatter as they both dropped their wands in order to clutch each other - Malfoy's hurt arm braced against the basin as much as he could and the other hard at the dip of Harry's spine, Harry's hands pressing Malfoy's collarbones back, holding him against the wall as Harry bit the spot he'd been promising himself on Malfoy's lip, sucked, licked, moaned stupid things that weren't words and weren't spells and weren't profanities or blessings or blasphemy into Malfoy's mouth.

Malfoy's hand was working its way round to the fastening of Harry's robes, scratching and pulling and pinching as it went, making Harry swear and wriggle and retaliate, dropping his own fingers to where Malfoy's robes parted to reveal trousers with buttons Harry had to wrestle with for far too long to release.

Their foreheads leant together, both panting raggedly, almost angrily, as Malfoy managed to get Harry's trousers down, boxers too, and Harry's hands encircled Malfoy's waist, dragging them both together in inelegant rhythm, no time, no inclination, no care for finesse, just taking, rutting, wanting, not caring about clothes in the way or the slipperiness of the floor or the way Malfoy's wound was bleeding through the makeshift bandage, dripping into the basin as he convulsed against it, knees locked, teeth buried in Harry's neck, Harry wrenched and pulled and swore at Malfoy, vocalising enough for both of them while Malfoy just gasped, releasing only the tiniest of moans before his breath hitched once, twice, and he dragged his bad arm round Harry's neck, yanking Harry down for kiss after breathless kiss as he came, biting the corner of Harry's mouth as he pulsed wet and hot between their bodies.

It was the bite that sent Harry over the edge, the flare of pain that brought him out of his haze of _have, hold, need, want, mine, mine_ into sudden, almost violent release that had him gasp and sag against Malfoy's body, fight forgotten, enemies forgotten, everything forgotten about Malfoy except Malfoy himself. Malfoy, who hadn't pushed Harry away.

Until now.

'Happy, Potter? Now you know,' said Malfoy, bitterly, shoving Harry back and scooping his wand up. His footsteps made a hollow splashing sound as he left the bathroom, leaving Harry undone and stained and panting amidst the spatter of the blood he'd shed.

***

Draco wishes he could explain it.

He knows what made Potter come to him in the bathroom and glare 'I hate you,' and mean 'I want you.' That's easy. Potter sees the world in black and white, he was trained that way. Draco sometimes wonders if Potter feels guilty about this, because he suspects that Potter has the stupid naive sex/love/marriage idea stapled into his head.

Draco knows what Potter doesn't, though, which is that desire is a function of hate as well as love. Desire isn't an emotion, it's a reaction. Love someone enough, hate someone enough, it doesn't matter - concentrating yourself on them so much means you start to want to own them. Potter has no self-control, no finesse. Potter is used to getting what he wants, as well, spoilt little famous brat that he is, and so who can blame him for not suppressing his desire? Draco even preens a little, knowing he's just that desirable.

So that's fine. Potter's motives are as transparent as he is, as bright and obvious and bold as Gryffindor red. But ...

Draco doesn't know why _he_ does it.

He supposes most of the same arguments could be turned to fit him - after all, he obsesses about Potter as well, in his way. And he notices that Potter is lean and attractive even with the scar and the glasses. He can compartmentalise it as obsession and attraction.

But that's not an explanation. It would be an explanation if he were taking vast quantities of photos and building a private shrine to wank over, but he's not. Obsession and attraction don't explain why you'd let your potentially most dangerous enemy under your clothes, let alone under your skin. Desire can't explain _stupidity_.

Hah. Desire. Desire makes it sound elegant. This isn't elegant. Draco knows elegant, knows this isn't it. Hasty Silencing Charms, bitemarks, hands, mouths, bodily fluids, these things are not elegant. While there could be said to be a certain grace in coupling, a beauty in making love, they don't do either.

Give it its proper name then, Draco. Go on. Call it lust. He hates the way it sounds, harsh, animal, guttural. It's that U, that's what it is. Stupid, visceral, dirty vowel that it is, formed deep in the lungs, grunted out alone, staccato - _uh, uh, uh_ in time with the push and pull of bodies, nestled in the centre of the one verb that's appropriate for what they do - _fuck_.

But when all's said and done, they do it because they can. Because they're _equals_. They're both being groomed to lead, even if Potter can't seem to see it. They even lead their friends, unable to find it in themselves to defer even to people they trust. And people automatically defer _to_ them. It's not that there aren't Slytherins Draco finds attractive, and who would be more than willing, but that's not an option.

Because it would be wrong. Because they'd never approach him, and he can't ask them, because they wouldn't refuse.

He does that with Potter because there's no demand afterwards. No wanting to hold each other, to rest, when Draco's mind won't shut down. No expecting anything. No drains on his time. Nothing but getting what he wants, what _they_ want, and leaving sated.

It's not violent, but it is silent. It's half-dressed, with wands left in pockets, within easy reach.

They do it because they can understand each other at the same time as they can never agree.

They do it because they can respect each other, even if they hate each other.

Draco has become the best Occlumens amongst the student body, according to Snape. He knows it frustrates the man to not be able to read him, but this is one secret the old snake cannot be allowed to take to the Dark Lord. So Draco has been practising harder and harder and harder every day since it started, since Potter cornered him in the boys' bathroom one night when they both should have been in bed, but weren't, and they both went for their wands, and Draco ended up bleeding. Potter'd frozen, then tried to help - and there was something in his eyes that made Draco take a second look, reach out with Legilimency like he'd been told never to try with another student and realise ...

Realise what they could have. What an opportunity this could be.

He thought at first he'd sell him to the Dark Lord. But while Potter's mind is as open as the sky when they're ... whatever, his thoughts are completely focused on the task at hand. There's nothing to sell, unless he were to grab Potter bodily and take him to where the Death Eaters meet with their master.

Draco's master too.

And that's why he has to stop this. Draco will be a Death Eater before the end of the year, and unable to refuse orders. And if the Dark Lord knew .... Draco will lose something he's come to see as _his_. He knows the Dark Lord wants to use him as a weapon, and he's honoured, but the Dark Lord can catch Potter himself.

It's stupid and petty, but Draco's being aimed at Dumbledore, not Potter. So he'll do what he's told, like a good minion. He's not being told to think. He's not expected to have any ingenuity. Despite the fact that Potter is under his nose, the Dark Lord has not asked him for Potter.

So Draco will practice his Occlumency and carry out his mission. It works while the only eye he's under is Snape's, and Snape is expecting him to be out of bed at strange hours, because of the mission, and he's not poking his long nose anywhere. But it's nearly the holidays. Time for family, and his family has a house-guest.

So he has his one last time, jammed with his shoulderblades grinding against the cubicle wall in the boys' bathroom on the second floor, and he takes savage joy in it, in making Potter _feel_ it, wanting him to feel it for weeks to come.

And when he leaves, he doesn't look back.


End file.
